Blog Name Change and some Tech. Babble

First of all, I am changing the blog's name. I know not what at present, but I don't want a "me, too" type of name. I have been working on the new Stylesheet, but Blogger and "don't be evil" Google seem to always find some way to break my CSS. If you look at my page source, you'll see that there is a lot of perfectly usable CSS that is maddeningly difficult to incorporate it into the latest Blogger software. Oh, it's easy enough to dump in there, but it doesn't display the way it would on, say, a less script heavy format. My pages used to display wonderfully. I used to keep my CSS current with Blogger updates, so all it took was a wee bit of tampering to have my pages appear well across browsers of any sort. I may simply open a new Blog to use as a CSS testbed. That really reeks of a disingenuous use of an ostensibly free resource, but what's a custom CSS developer to do? Too much about that.

In technology today, I found some interesting stuff.

Apple unveils new Prog. Lang.

WIRED reports programmers went "nuts" over the presentation. I yawned. Apple should support open standards. Ruby and Python are proven, and developers like working with them. "Objective-C" is new-ish, and doesn't seem to offer anything in the way of newer, better, faster, stronger, codebase development for guys like me, for instance. For almost half a year, I have been working on a email plug-in that might revolutionize the way in which people deal with a certain aspect of email nuisances. I have written it in Extensible Markup Language(XML), as well as in every language that requires special case handling to account for the differences in mail clients and/or operating systems. Sorry about that digression. Getting back on track.. I hope Apple coders like the new language, but Apple should have made the best of all moves, and used an open programming language. OpenCL and OpenGL simply aren't that open. This is really only an issue for game developers and those really tweaking UIs, but still, come on! These things are only truly open if they're supported at the hardware level, not through porting, or worse, emulation. Eek!

In other tech. news, it finally looks like Amazon is FINALLY going to be launching the long rumored "smartphone" on 18, June. I wish Bezos and Amazon well. It looks to be a 3D phone..I really don't know why that's so interesting. It very much reminds me of Douglas Adams's pronouncement: "Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea..." In all seriousness, smartphones aren't all that. Call me a techno-snob if you wish. Many others have. So the phone is going to have projection capabilities. It seems only natural as Amazon had to do SOMETHING to differentiate itself from the pack. Of course Amazon does have something of a built-in userbase of millions and millions of shoppers. My forecast is that Amazon is will use existing hardware platforms--a new processor design and any attendant major tweaks to the "support staff" would not have escaped this blogger's attention--and will sell for at most 150 USD...at launch.

There was a lot more that I noted yesterday and today, but this is not a technology blog. I get enough of that at the office.

Science later!

My, But That's a Big One

No. Not that. We're talking about exo-planets FKA "Extra-solar Planets"."

Newly Discovered Exoplanet 17 Times More Massive Than Earth

Okay, if you read the article it states--I kid you not--that the newly discovered exoplanet is "17 times heavier than our planet." Heavier? For whom are these people writing? I really feel like banging my forehead into my keyboard. Are we that mathematically and scientifically challenged to have mass wrongly conveyed as weight in order for people to understand just what has been discovered?

Sigh.

The discovery itself is interesting for a whole host of reasons.

I'll choose two for illustrative purposes:

Firstly, theorists weren't certain that a 'rocky' planet could have this much mass and mot be a gas giant..like say, Jupiter. Well, I wonder just how this theory(more like speculation) was arrived at. It's foolish to base prejudices on what we see in our little insignificant eight planet system. One has to believe that more massive rocky planets have yet to be discovered. It seems to me that--mathematics aside--since the new planet "Kepler-10c" has an orbit very close to it's star, that hydogen and helium would have literally gravitated to the more massive star than a close, less massive object. I'm sure that some variant of the inverse square equation would put that right.

Secondly, if the scientific community is correct about the age of Kepler-10c--a mere 3 billion years after the universe's 'creation'--, heavier elements were available for planetary formation and much more interesting forms of chemistry. Very early life, anyone? This doesn't really surprise me as really massive hot burning stars have very short lives indeed. Lots of supernovae equate to lots of heavier elements.

I'm sort of shocked that the astronomical community has such a parochial view of things. This Pale Blue Dot(much thanks to the late Carl Sagan) is truly inconsequential on the galactic scale, much less the universal. Provincialism it seems, is not only the purview of politicians and other assorted charlatans.

Please don't get me wrong. I hold the scientific community in the highest regard possible for human beings. Nature, on the other hand, humbles us all the time, and the surprises that this discovery illuminate serve to show us just how wedded our thinking is to this insignificant speck of the universe. That said, it's the only place we have. We make our stand right here. That, in a great many ways, is a shame.

No Surprise Here: Humans, not climate, account for Disappearance of Pleistocene Megafauna

Humans, not climate, to blame for Ice Age-era disappearance of large mammals, study concludes

This poor author would have been shocked if the research pointed in ANY other direction. Heck, even though I am but a lowly semiconductor engineer, I have long thought that the latest mass extinction event was due to human activity; and just not since the Maori dined on the last Moa. We're apex predators, and the extinction vector(time of extinction and human migratory activities) of large land faunae just fit too well to dismiss the most likely factor in the onset of the Holocene Extinction Event. One could further speculate at this point that the period under the latest finding likely does not extend far enough back into time, as pre-modern hominids were likely also thinning populations of large terrestrial vertebrates to the point of no longer being able to sustain mating practices. With very few exceptions, the notion of the "noble savage" is wholly unwarranted.

I have been arguing the reason behind the megafauna extinction point with people in the field for several decades. Some have been in total agreement, others outright denial. What is really no longer open for debate is that "we" are causing, and being witness to, the sixth mass extinction event known to afflict this planet.

It is my hope that we are smart enough to start to curb species extinctions now. Our history here isn't at all promising.

The one thing we should give our children is a planet worthy of their custodial duty. It is our collective duty to make this a reality. Whilst my fingers are crossed, the rainforests burn, and the oceans become less able to trap atmospheric carbon as both surface temperatures rise, and plankton dies. There's no reason to be optimistic. But still, we must do whatever we can to mitigate the decline of the planet's toxification and subsequent species destruction.

It must be Cancer Tuesday

Below, I brought you the lung cancers breathalyzer.

Now, we have two intriguing studies about Mole Rats. Oddly, the two remotely related species have developed some tantalizingly similar adaptations to dealing with their subterranean existences which via the process of natural selection, make the small rodents almost entirely cancer free. One can imagine inducing tumor growth in laboratory conditions, hence the bit of a hedge.

The Blind Mole Rat appears to have a doubling of the genes that produce interferon beta-1, and a host of other adaptations.

The Naked-Mole-Rat appears to have a host of similar adaptive genes that enable both it and it's distant cousin to survive in very low oxygen environs without suffering all the typical ills of O2 deprivation.

That these adaptative changes both suit their hosts in their subterranean lives and appear to make it difficult to induce tumor development even when given oncogenic cocktails which prove lethal to mice is intriguing indeed. Since nature does little in the way of holding on to genetic material that serves no purpose, but ratchets up on beneficial mutations, it seems plausible that these long-lived rodents--which are neither moles nor rats--are retaining these genetic variations for manifold reasons. Plausibility does not in any way constitute fact, but once the tales of these two remarkable creatures get sorted out, don't be surprised if the low 02 and high CO2 adaptations stand quite alone from the genes that code for, and are expressed as cancer fighting battalions.

The world may yet yield to the 'misnomered' Mole Rats.

Dave Grohl..what's this about? New Diagnostic Lung Cancer Test

Okay, just to show my reader that I am not ALL SCIENCE, ALL THE TIME, I have to give Dave Grohl(Nirvana, Foo Fighters, etc.) a shout out. I love music, too. Although very little of current music causes me to take notice, Foo Fighters are really something special. Sorry, RHCP fans, Foo Fighters are where my rockin' mind goes whenever I think of bands that are still doing it. RHCP is Flea, with back-ups. Foo Fighters are fresh and a throw-back to real good rock. Apparently, Dave has inked a deal with HBO detailing the band's next album as travelogue.

That should be fun.

In other total coolness news, the full 38+ minutes of Nirvana's R&R Hall induction can finally be seen in decent quality on the web

Whilst medical breakthroughs aren't strictly science(applied technology), I can roam there occasionally as this is my party. A breathalyzer for lung cancer detection, that allegedly, not only detects lung cancers, but also--again, allegedly--differentiates between stages is really very cool indeed. The odd part about most lung cancers in the USA is that they are almost entirely avoidable. Kids these days are hopefully taught about the evils of recurring inhalations of tobacco smoke. I am not entirely without guilt here. I was shown a cancerous pair of lungs at a science museum at around ten years of age, yet I still smoked a bit as a teen, and then into my twenties while engaging in ethanol consumption. I have not allowed tobacco smoke to enter the temple of my body for approximately twenty-six years.

I also quit boozing at any level roughly fourteen years ago. Since both activities can give rise to myriad medical issues, it just seems prudent to go completely without either. I do miss the inebriant effect of ethanol, but the potential downsides far outweigh the few hours of social lubrication that ethanol certainly provides.

That's all for now. I may yet find a hard science item worthy of a few words.

I should note here that the blog isn't meant as a geek's tool to scientific nirvana(sorry about the pun). It's rather a place to start researching items that you might find interesting. In all honesty, a blog about cutting-edge advances in semi-conductor gate processes and shrinking lithography isn't likely to garner much readership. Oh, I could write about programming, web development, and all things network related, but there must thousands of blogs that already address these concerns.

At a less technical level, I could wax on about mineralogy, and paleontology, but blogs like the truly excellent Pharyngula blog and others. If there is a clamor for an amateur mineralogy blog, I would be honored to provide much more in-depth treatments about the geology of northern New England, and sites, specimens, etc. I suspect that this would have even less a following than another 'big tent' science blog; which is really what I see this becoming as time passes.

Discovery Channel and History Channel are full of utter rubbish

"Bigfoot Expert" and why Discovery Channel Stinks

This hardly warrants comment. At a time when all of humanity needs to be schooled on REAL science, two of the networks that one would think would stick to the known, do not. Discovery and History are rife with all manner of not only unproven topical programming, but demonstrably false programming.

One of Discovery's worst offenders is referenced in the above link. The History Channel is teeming with everything but history. A look at any other network is likely to uncover other offenses to the senses.

One tiny light in all of this is that it seems that both of these networks have dropped references to "aliens" in the extra-terrestrial sense. In their stead are dozens of reality shows(so-called), that aren't at all real save for programming being based on what a very few people do to earn their ways through life.

Less fill, and more hard hitting sciance and history would do both outlets some real good. I don't see it happening. They'll almost assuredly continue to wallow in least common denominator programming.

That is truly a crime when so much is at stake.

Sandy Hook as False Flag

No, this is not going to be a political post. It is going to be psychological post.

Sandy Hook as False Flag Maneuver

How can people believe that the Sandy Hook school shooting was a "False Flag" event orchestrated by some unknown entity?

The answer is that people can and will believe anything not only in lieu of any supporting evidence, but even despite mountains of contrary evidence.

From Holocaust deniers, to non-belief in modern evolutionary theory, there will always be skeptics of the unwarranted variety.

I am what I hope is a good example of a good skeptic. I believe when independently verifiable evidence warrants such a belief. I'll often withhold belief until it is quantified. As a practical scientist(a semiconductor process engineer), I believe that there is almost shockingly little that cannot be quantified.

The human brain/mind is sometimes stated as the most complex system yet known. Yet, even the human brain can be broken down and the roles of each component can be defined--yes, even quantitatively.

In order to overturn the Sandy Hook shooting, enough of the evidence must be found to be demonstrably untrue(not false, as proving a negative is maddeningly difficult). To date, no evidence other than some instructions to reporters covering the Newtown, CT has surfaced to support anything but the factual evidence of a mass shooting.

The instructions to reporters is simply an artifact of the media's manner to get people positioned properly for the best angles, and having copy ready for the news items that hit the 'airwaves.' This is how all news items are covered that are not absolutely live. That reporter cueing is given as evidence of a cover-up simply shows an obvious lack of the ways in which modern television broadcasting is conducted.

I am not in the media business, but living in the little state of New Hampshire, USA, every four years our first in the nation' presidential primaries I have seen every kind of media machination one can imagine. In the 2000 primary, I sat and ate with a secret service agent and we had a long discussion about how the media gets things correct, and incorrect. I added that most of the major media doesn't give one enough matter on a given topic in order for an inquisitive citizen to go and "conduct follow-up research without first conducting follow-up research." My lunch date got a good chuckle out of my characterization which she thought spot-on.

Summing up, one has to provide contrary evidence in enough magnitude to first challenge the official story, and that only raises the specter of doubt. It hardly overthrows things.

Do governments lie? Absolutely. Is the government lying in this instance? Perhaps, but as yet there is zero real evidence of any misdoing.

It's fun to be a contrarian. But a contrarian sans evidence is simply a nuisance that takes away from real, important issues; and in this instance likely causes additional pain to the mourning survivors.

Changing stylesheet

I'm going to work on a new stylesheet for this newly resurrected* blog.

*I use the word "resurrected" here in the strictly secular sense. This blog shall always remain a non-prophet enterprise.

Climate Change vs. Global Climate Change?

Americans at large are really wishy-washy about the subject of global climate change. Currently, belief in the fact of Global Climate Change is on the wane, as the northern hemisphere had a cold winter. No matter that November 2013 was the hottest November on record. I think that this is due to many factors.

The first is pretty obvious. Americans do not know the difference between 'weather' and 'climate.' We certainly had a cold winter in North America this last season. That's weather, not climate.

Secondly, since Americans know so little math and science, they fall prey to notions that they want to believe. This isn't really the fault of scientist's(more about that in a bit). It has much more to do with the non-scientist cum climate change expert casting doubts on the fact of global warming as being specious. Oft cited things have been resoundingly answered by real climate scientists, but it's the first message that garners all the attention. A sound bite is easy, science is far more nuanced, and hence takes much longer to explain.

Third, the scientific community needs to be much more vocal. The data is in. Anthropogenic global warming is a fact. No one likes this fact, but not liking a fact doesn't falsify it.

I'll add one more. It is perhaps not in the best interest of entrenched businesses to embrace the seismic shift that they must undertake in order to thrive in the new reality. These legacy businesses are both huge and powerful. It is perhaps these interests that have done the most to cast doubt about the reality of global warming. They have paid for bad science in an attempt to overturn mountains of date that point in one direction. The direction for climate change occurring even as these studies are being paid for ought to be criminal.

NYT Blog Post on American views of Global Climate Change

THE most important website on the Internet: Real Climate: Climate science from climate scientists

Real Climate is more important than Google by orders of magnitude. Go and learn.

400 Parts Per million..and rising

400 PPM and Rising!

While largely a symbolic figure, symbolism is the level at which most of my fellow countrymen ever seem delve into an issue. Climate Change deniers will be will us while they bake, drown, starve, or freeze. The simple fact it that atmospheric CO2 is at levels not seen since at least 800 thousands years ago. Estimates now range that levels have not been where they now reside for at least 2 million years.

Even the staunchest climate change denier cannot think that the experiment we're performing on the planet is a good thing.

If the predicted El Nino(~75% probability) hots the northern hemisphere this year, there will me an exodus of people AGAIN believing in global climate change. The masses in the US are so utterly propagandized that they cannot hold--at least en masse--a long term position where even predicted extremes of weather events reinforce, rather than nullify, the reality of global warming.

I'm sure to revisit this issue again and again, so no need to waste more your time today.

Quantum Mechanics in the news!

Stephen Weinberg and Gerard ’t Hooft(a pair of Noble Laureates that helped deepen the strangeness of QM) are further roiling our lack of understanding of quantum phenomena. Since the article from whence I pulled the names of two of the movers and shakers of 20th century QM does a reasonable job of misunderstanding these two new interpretations of QM, I'll merely provide links.

Quantum entanglement has always fascinated me since I first read about it as post-grad trying to get a better handle on the the physics behind the smallest semiconductor gates allowable. No, it was not part of the curriculum, but I am always unsatisfied in not knowing natural phenomena. I dived right into the heady brew of QE as fun. Even using Feynman diagrams(which were hugely beneficial in most other areas of QM) I had issues with QE. No treatment seemed satisfactory. Perhaps now that has changed. I'm not going to try and assimilate these new explanations into my now older and enfeebled mind. Perhaps after the dust has settled I may put a toe in the water.

I should point out that during my post-grad work I could only pass the physics tests where QM properties were found. It took several years of being in the field before I had any sense that this stuff was real, and how much of it fit together.

When my mind was engaged in something entirely unrelated the darkness became less so. I am still fascinated by what I feel is the greatest achievement of human thought; The Standard Model. Enough about geeky extra-curricular physics play. Here's the dope.

The article in Sci-News

Here's where the lifting gets heavy :)

Weinberg's Abstract

Hooft's Abstract

Given that Steven Weinberg is a lucid and engaging writer, there is likely to a book on his new paradigm at some future time. This humble blogger finds that popular treatments of QM are almost meaningless, unless the book or lecture gets into the underpinning mathematics. Really, who wants that? Only someone that has done the mathematics peculiar to QM would want that. This really defeats the purpose of popular treatments.

My two favorite physicist's that deepened our misunderstanding of QM are Richard Feynman ans Murray Gell-Mann. I owe more of my own misunderstanding of QM to these two giants of the field than perhaps all others combined.

Ken Ham is still trying to warp facts around an already held conclusion

Creation Museum Fossil Claimed as Proof of Noah’s Flood.

Hard to know what to say. Ham--an Australian immigrant, more about that later--continues to make not only unsubstantiated claims, but claims that run contrary to all the evidence from science. I should note here that 'the sciences' do not operate independently, but are a series of overlapping disciplines that make predictions. Yes, even paleontology makes predictions as to where to look for new forms. See Tiktaalik for one of the most recent examples.

Ham is no scientist. The Bible isn't a science book. The Bible is an artifact of the knowledge base of the (presumably) men of their time. A time in which there was no science. Mere observation is not science.

Why do people still believe in the literal truth of the Bible when the Bible itself is not logically internally consistent? The answers to this puzzling anachronism are not in this humble blogger's purview. Evolutionary anthropologists, and psychologists can--and indeed have--given the topics a thorough treatment.

Ham has zero evidence to back up his claim. One has to wonder if Ham believes what he states. His interests are entirely tied up in the literal truth of Biblical scripture, although I missed the parts about humans interacting with carnosaurs.

The case here is that there is no case. Ham makes stuff up to keep people tithing at the gate.Does he believe this nonsense? I am doubtful.

There is zero evidence to support Ham's claims, and mountains of evidence that support the science side of things. Everything from radiometric dating to modern geology's understanding of the age of the earth to cosmology's age of the universe are independently derived--and quantifiable refututions--of the literal truth of the Bible. That all of these disciplines are in agreement doesn't prove anything. They only represent among the greatest acheivements of the human mind to date.

Now I said something about Ham's Aussie roots. There is another high profile immigrant from Oz that doesn't hide behind antiquated, and perhaps justly revered books, as a method of concealment. Yes, Rubert Murdoch of Fox media at least formerly would go into his news outlets and tell copy staffers what the truth was for the day.

Why aren't these two gents peddling their ideologies in their native Australia? Perhaps these ex-pats could not feed their tripe to the less propagandized Aussie populace? That's not even conjecture. I am simply really curious about why here? I think it's fair to state that US citizens are the most highly propagandized population on the planet. It is not a matter of KNOWING that we are so; it is the insidiousness of advertising from cradle to grave that instills in many a sense that we know what's really going on. The data on everything from the thrill some achieve from shopping as form of therapy, to belief of everything single-sourced without attributions point towards a well entertained, but shallow thinking country. The PR industry has won all the rounds to this point.

Let us take back our brains.

The Blog's resurrection(no, this one's not a myth), and different focus

Hello gentle reader!

I stopped blogging in earnest as other pursuits--like starting two businesses--came to take over my life(so called).

Well, I'm back. Political blogs are everywhere. I'm shifting the blog's focus to things you aren't likely to find on facebook.

That is, to say, anything of real depth.

Another prime motivator is that since the rise of the search engine, people think less deeply about nearly everything.

This post will not be about why that is a demonstrable fact having to do with neuroplasticity, but is a shot across anyone's bow that I'm no longer going to repeat blather garnered by media outlets.

As a workaday scientist(I am an electronic engineer masquerading as a computer scientist) I have special knowledge in only the fields of semiconductors(varied), medical imaging device design, and arcane mathematics. I'll admit to still not having a firm a grasp on QM as I'd like. But then, I'm hardly alone in this regard.

Enough about that. Since no political party represents functional anarchy as a platform, there is no longer a place in the political sphere for the likes of me. Hence the change. I haven't changed my political views, but since I am not crazy, well, most of the rest of what makes it from one person to another isn't quite sane.

The blog will now be a haven for my metaphysical naturalistic-and hence materialistic-views on science, mathematics, and why so few people can tell you how even a simple radio works. It really may as well be magic to most people. Oh, they may wax a bit about 'flowing electrons' but that's likely as far as my countrymen could go with anything like a semblance of accuracy.

I am not going to get into deep water here. This is, after all, merely a public blog.

I'll aim for one sciencey and mathy piece per day. But perhaps most importantly I'll try and illuminate the way that the media, punditry, get almost everything science, math and logic, related wrong to one degree or another.

Back in Business for the Silly Season!

Test. Test. This is only a test to see in Blogger allows my old, yet groovy CSS tricks.

Buy.com and the worst customer service in the world

While Keith Olbermann makes fun of people labeling them "The Worst Person(s) in The World," we here at PBS headquarters deal with the dirtiest elements of internet retailers. It is into these waters we swim daily. Today's honoree is Buy.com. Buy.com honors neither their stated price match policy, nor anything remotely like a reasonable return policy.

If you're giving a gift, go elsewhwere. Their 14 day return policy is a sham.

Office Depot makes Buy.com seem like Amazon.com(which does have a reasonable return policy)

The scenario is this, I bought two MP3 players from Buy.om in December. I gave one as a gift that was unopened until 01.01.09. The gifted player was DOA. I emailed Buy.com and explained in detail the situation. I was told that I would have to pay postage to get the player to the manufacturer and wait for a replacement.

So, I emailed the manufacturer with the email response from Buy.com forwarded as an attachment. The manunfacturer emailed me a RMA(Return Material Authorization) number and said nothing about who was to pay shipping. I emailed the manufacturer again, and here it is, five days hence and I have yet to get a response.

Buy.com, Sandisk Corp., and the refurbisher - xtremeupgrade.com are all more trouble than they're worth. I have yet to resolve this situation, and if the above parties do not respond to my reasonable requests for assistance, I'll make the links live and post the emails - complete with header information.

Caveat Emptor!

Office Depot: Another retailer with shitty service

I ordered a desk form Office Depot yesterday(it's the Studio RTA Malibu desk). I only ordered it online because the price shown was better than that advertised in the circular. It clearly showed the desk as $79.99 with a -30.00 "Mail-In Savings" offer. I thought that this was a bit odd. I called 1-800GO-DEPOT and spoke to a CSR that told me her name was 'Ace.' I was definitely calling a Bangalore Call Center. More on that in a moment. I was skeptical as I could not get the "MIS" form page to come up. I'd click the link, and be transported to a blank page. I was told not to worry. 'Ace' assured me that the "MIS" was valid - just a database glitch you understand - so instead of traveling the 50 miles to pick the desk up, I ordered it online. As of this morning at 8:00AM EDT the "MIS" link was still up. I went to breakfast. When I came back, I hopped online, and lo and behold, the -30.00 MIS link vanished.

So I got on the phone. I waited, and waited. Then waited some more. I explained to this CSR who claimed his name was "Alex" the entire story including my decision not to drive to pick up the desk. I repeated salient parts of the issue a couple of times. Finally, Alex got it. He told me that I would have to be transferred to the "Rebate Center," and would do so..So he did. After waiting on speakerphone for a timed 30 minutes, "Chelsea" takes my call. She too sounded like she was from the sub-continent.

After explaining my issue to Chelsea, she told the obvious; that there is no rebate form listed and that I would have to go to 1-800-GO-DEPOT. By this point I have wasted three hours between placing the order, being put on hold, and transfers. Chelsea's transfer didn't make it. I called 1-800-GO-Away-YOU-BOTHER-ME again. I got another "Alex." Too weird. I started to go into my story again when Alex, the return, told me that I had to speak to someone in the rebate center.

At this point, I emailed Office Depot, and am awaiting a response.

Add'l: "Chelsea" initially picked up my call and said in the clearest English: "Thank you for calling HP, how may I help you?"

Let's just state at this juncture, this is the worst experience I've had when actually dealing with humans on the other end of the line. If you're thinking about doing business with Office Depot, you have been warned.

I'll provide updates as required and available.

Another Bush term, another recession

So, the son is just like the father in two unseemly ways:

1)Each term brings a recession

2)Each term brings a war(junior was quite the precocious little weasel here, as he invaded two countries in his first term)

How Does He Do It?

w, hero of the world averred today:

Bush, taking questions from reporters on a variety of topics, said the United States still believes that al-Qaida was behind last week's disrupted plot to blow up U.S.-bound airliners from Britain.

"It sure looks like it. ... It looks like the kind of thing al-Qaida would do," he said. But he said the United States has not made a definite conclusion about the sponsorship of the plan.

Asked if there might be any U.S.-based participants, Bush said, "Any time we get a hint that there might be a terror cell in the United States, we move on it."

Now Bush not only knows the mind of al-Qaida, but he and his pals are going to move on terror cells! Amazing!

How Does He Do It?

Let's watch to see if we can find the source of his power.

w: quite a guy...with a little help from Johannes ;)

link to quote source and article

Hersh on Neo-cons, Israel, Hezbollah..

..and other observances.

The last remaining investigative journo in America pens this:

In the days after Hezbollah crossed from Lebanon into Israel, on July 12th, to kidnap two soldiers, triggering an Israeli air attack on Lebanon and a full-scale war, the Bush Administration seemed strangely passive. “It’s a moment of clarification,” President George W. Bush said at the G-8 summit, in St. Petersburg, on July 16th. “It’s now become clear why we don’t have peace in the Middle East.” He described the relationship between Hezbollah and its supporters in Iran and Syria as one of the “root causes of instability,” and subsequently said that it was up to those countries to end the crisis. Two days later, despite calls from several governments for the United States to take the lead in negotiations to end the fighting, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that a ceasefire should be put off until “the conditions are conducive.”

The Bush Administration, however, was closely involved in the planning of Israel’s retaliatory attacks. President Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney were convinced, current and former intelligence and diplomatic officials told me, that a successful Israeli Air Force bombing campaign against Hezbollah’s heavily fortified underground-missile and command-and-control complexes in Lebanon could ease Israel’s security concerns and also serve as a prelude to a potential American preëmptive attack to destroy Iran’s nuclear installations, some of which are also buried deep underground.

Israeli military and intelligence experts I spoke to emphasized that the country’s immediate security issues were reason enough to confront Hezbollah, regardless of what the Bush Administration wanted. Shabtai Shavit, a national-security adviser to the Knesset who headed the Mossad, Israel’s foreign-intelligence service, from 1989 to 1996, told me, “We do what we think is best for us, and if it happens to meet America’s requirements, that’s just part of a relationship between two friends. Hezbollah is armed to the teeth and trained in the most advanced technology of guerrilla warfare. It was just a matter of time. We had to address it.”

Well, there's a load of surprises(heavy sarcasm).

Go and read this!.

Hersh even manages to get old friends like Dick Armitage in on the act. I'm a bit disappointed that Dicky Perle didn't make the piece. Now that man knows how to party! ;)

Sy lays it all out for you in his inimitable style. Not florid prose, but logically sequenced for all but Faux News viewers. He reports, BushCo. lies.

Remember when Perle called Hersh(and I'm slightly paraphrasing) "the closest thing to a terrorist we have in American journalism?" Really takes ya back.

But I digress.

Go. Read. Now.

Get Out The Duct Tape!

Remember way back in the halcyon days of the WoT(War on Terrah)?

What was the drill again? Stop, duct tape, and blubber? Well maybe not precisely, but close enough for Department of Homeland Security(DHS) work ;)

Well, I know that this is going to come as a shock to you all, but there is a segment of the population that believes that the DHS guidelines are woefully inadequate.

No! It is not the choir at the Rapture Ready bulletin board!

It's those pointy heads at the Federation of American Scientists. The nerve of those people. They issued a press release and launched webpages mocking those of our beloved DHS.

The FAS folks count 'extreme heat' amongst their list of natural disasters. Apparently some folks think that this could be a real issue in the near future.

The FAS is far ahead of the politicos in taking global climate change seriously. This is a welcome development.

Can terrorists kill some people? Sure. Can terrorists end civilization as we know it? No. Unless they score the nukes of the US or Russia. Climate change, on the other hand, can accomplish what the terrorists cannot.

Bravo, FAS! Now that Kansas has re-entered the 21st century, maybe, just maybe, we'll have some real action on the climate front.

I am not however, holding my breath.